Thursday, February 14, 2008

Can conservatives trust John McCain to appoint judges?

“The Presidential winner in November will probably appoint no fewer than two Supreme Court Justices. The likeliest vacancies, from an actuarial perspective, will come from the liberal wing of the Court. So a President Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton has the potential to set back the prolife agenda by 30 years. It could well be a generation before a President would have another opportunity to shift the balance on the Court to the right. [John] McCain’s harshest critics argue that his judicial picks could easily be as bad as anyone tapped by Mrs. Clinton or Mr. Obama. This is caricature, but even if it had merit, [they] would be trading the risk that Mr. McCain picks moderates for the court for the certainty that his opponent would appoint liberals. It’s always possible Mr. McCain would make a bad Supreme Court nomination, just as Ronald Reagan picked Anthony Kennedy, who later affirmed Roe v. Wade... The conservative coalition has learned a lot about picking judges since 1987, and especially since the nomination of David Souter by another Republican President. As the Harriet Myers interlude proved, another mystery pick by Mr. McCain or any other GOP President is far less likely than it used to be...[S]ocial conservatives may decide they can’t vote for Mr. McCain for any number of reasons. What they can’t do with any credibility is claim that helping to elect a liberal President will further the causes that these conservatives claim to believe most deeply in.” —The Wall Street Journal

In this crap shoot I would have bet on McCain. I am not happy about the odds, so my wager will be small.